Talk:Threatening government officials of the United States

Title

I wonder if the title, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/12/21/eric-cantor-glendon-swift_n_1163561.html might be better? Threatening United States Government officials sounds a bit like it's the officials who are threatening! Johnhousefriday (talk) 14:00, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

You have a good point. The only reason I haven't implemented that is Wikipedia:TITLE#Article_title_format which states that the singular form should generally be used, but perhaps the need to eliminate ambiguity overrides that. Tisane (talk) 14:37, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

I think that "Threats against United States government officials" is a better title than the current one. I'd like to move this article. MDEVER802 (talk) 22:34, 17 August 2012 (UTC)

erroneous link deleted

I deleted an erroneous link that links to the Japanese Military Police instead of the DCPD or wherever.Napkin65 (talk) 02:39, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Threatening the citizens of the United States

I move that this entire article be deleted as superfluous above and beyond the entry on [threat]. I see nothing particular special about officials of the United States that would merit such an entry, over officials of any other country, or individuals of any group.

Otherwise, shouldn't we have articles on "Threatening the government officials of _______ country" for every single country, and / or "Threatening the citizens of _______ country" for every single country, as well as the same for any particular group.

I would argue that any time any of any country's officials arrests or brings accusation against an individual, that would constitute a clear and obvious threat of imprisonment, slavery, and/or execution, and so merit entries under its own right, perhaps as stubs of [Individualist Anarchism] or [Self ownership]. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.226.11.248 (talk) 17:19, 8 March 2012 (UTC)

Threats have loomed large within the past two years as a way for advancing one particular political party's platform. This has included encouragement by some Members of Congress of intimidation and threats against other Members of Congress, Cabinet members and White House employees. Senator Rand Paul and Congressman Steve Scalise were physically assaulted by Democratic Party loyalists - Rep. Scalise, along with others, was shot by a supporter of Bernie Sanders's Presidential campaign. Sen. Susan Collins and her staff were bombarded with threats and verbal abuse intended to intimidate her from voting her conscience on approval of Judge Brett Kavanaugh's appointment to the Supreme Court.

The purpose of these assaults and threats was to influence the behavior of United States government officials. More such acts have been called for. Twitter and other social media platforms are failing to punish or delete calls for this sort of harassment. This underscores the notability of the subject of this article - it's a very fraught issue now.

The other acts you say may also be "threats" may violate other laws, or may be violations of the jus gentium. They may also be lawful and ethical actions. But they are yet to be demonstrated to be notable enough to merit wikipedia articles of their own. The act of threatening a United States government official is notable, as shown by sections of the US Code cited in this article's text. Acts of Congress are generally considered to be notable.

Notability and verifiability are the cornerstones of our work. You haven't shown that any of the other topics you mention are notable enough to deserve a wikipedia article or that verifiable sources exist confirming what you say is true. loupgarous (talk) 12:22, 7 October 2018 (UTC)

Similar laws outside of United States?

Is there a similar law outside of USA like in Canada, UK, Japan, South Africa, Australia, Mexico, France, etc? --Ryan (talk) 09:42, 20 August 2016 (UTC)

There is no info on what class of felony threatening the President is

Most of the sources on the matter are from after January 2015, and therefore likely got their information from Wikipedia, so to use them would be circular citation. 2600:1003:B111:30CC:C09B:A9D1:D74A:A710 (talk) 16:06, 9 April 2018 (UTC)

The source primarily cited in our article was Cornell Law School's Legal Information Institute, a valid secondary source on the wording of laws against the act of threatening US Government officals. I'll leave following specific citation links to you as an exercise for the reader. loupgarous (talk) 00:22, 7 October 2018 (UTC)

WP:UNDUE Issues in "Legislators" Section (Probably Because it Needs Updating)

The "Legislators" Section of our article is dated, and places undue weight on two relatively minor threat incidents compared to actual physical attacks on Senator Rand Paul and Representative Steve Scalise (who, among others present at a softball practice, was shot by a supporter of Senator Bernie Sanders's Presidential campaign), calls by Representative Maxine Waters for harassment of Trump administration officials and elected Republican officials, and the recent mass of threats and intimidation directed at Senator Susan Collins during the Kavanaugh confirmation hearings.

I propose condensing our references to the Catherine Crabill and Sharron Angle incidents to convey the fact of the purported threats and any information balancing the perception that the comments were actual threats. We also need to refer to more recent calls by Maxine Waters for harassment and intimidation of Republican officials.

We probably should mention what has been described as the first physical assault on a sitting US Senator (Rand Paul} in recent history, the shootings of Rep. Scalise and Rep. Gabrielle Gifford and actual harassment and intimidation tactics directed at Senator Ted Cruz and his family, White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders and her family, Secretary of Homeland Security Kirstjen Nielsen, the doxxing of Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers by wikileaks, and the recent apprehension of a member of Representative Sheila Jackson Lee's staff on multiple charges of disclosing and threatening to disclose personal information on Federal legislators and their families as evidence that threats and intimidation are becoming increasingly common tools of discourse at the Federal level.

That would bring our coverage of threats aimed at and intimidation of Federal legislators and officials up-to-date and place due weight on each incident we report in our article. loupgarous 18:21, 7 October 2018 (UTC)

Since the changes were primarily deleting material of questionable relevance to the article's subject (either determined not to be threats or not threats aimed at specific Federal officials) and discussing more recent threats and assaults on legislators and other officials (and Rep. Maxine Waters' call for protesters to gather crowds to harass their political opponents personally), I made what I felt were appropriate changes. I solicit suggestions for any further changes. loupgarous 20:38, 7 October 2018 (UTC)

Ambiguity

Is there any way to remove the ambiguity of the wording "Threatening government officials of the United States"? I am sure Donald Trump is seen by many as a threatening government official. But I cannot think of a way around this at the moment. --Hob Gadling (talk) 09:51, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

The part of the US Code making it illegal to threaten a US government official is "18 U.S. Code, Section 871. Threats against President and successors to the Presidency". I was hoping that section would have a pithy title we could use, but I think that would be even more ambiguous for our article. The actual law only refers to "threats" in its title and in its text, but the original editors of this article chose the gerund participle "threatening" because it's flexible, a noun, verb or an adjective depending on how you use it.

I'd stick with their judgment, because editors started off as users of wikipedia who liked it so much, we joined the company. Cheers! loupgarous (talk) 23:33, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

see WP:SOAP HammerFilmFan (talk) 06:47, 10 August 2023 (UTC)

Bias

I have not reviewed the editing page, but the section on legislators is clearly biased in only mentioning acts against Republicans, even mentioning numerous acts that are not threats at all, but mentioning off-topic subjects only when they are against Republicans. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 195.200.221.64 (talk) 11:07, 2 October 2021 (UTC)

Please list specifics that you have issues with - a general blanket statement is of no use. HammerFilmFan (talk) 06:46, 10 August 2023 (UTC)